The Great British Bake Off: Semi Final, Fondant Fancies

It was the semi finals in The Great British Bake Off this week, and sadly that means we are coming close to the end of this blog series. But, it’s all good I have plenty of yummy bakes lined up for when the bake off is over for you to enjoy.

For this week’s bake off challenge I decided to have a go at making Fondant Fancies and let me tell you they are messy to make but I surprised myself on how well they turned out. Ok, so they aren’t perfect but they are good enough for me.

So, lets start off with saying my interpretation of this recipe didn’t actually go to plan when I started. I followed a Mary Berry recipe and if I had the correct size pan this would have turned out perfect. But, I didn’t. Anywho! It is an easy recipe to follow and I recommend trying it. Click the link below to Mary Berry’s recipe or you can use the recipe card I made below and follow that instead.

I think I should start with how following this recipe didn’t really work so I kind of just carried on and just did it. The main problem I had was not having the right pan size, I didn’t really no what pan I was suppose to have so I just went with what I had. I used two small rectangle pans and split the batter between them, silently hoping that they will raise and will be a good height.

So, ahh…. they didn’t raise how I wanted it too. But it’s ok I decided to put some apricot jam on top of one layer and then put the other sponge on top of that. Then I cut away the sides to make sure that when I cut them into squares they have straight edges.

I actually thought this was a clever idea and in away everything else will follow the recipe but I’m just making a smaller amount. The next part is to brush on a small amount of apricot jam onto the top sponge and then roll out your marzipan. My shop was really annoying and only sold it in big amounts, so that resulted in me having lots of it left over. I’ll have to find a away to use it, if you have an idea or recipe I would love to no, just tweet me @amybakes94.

Next, you make your buttercream and put it in the fridge, and then you cut the cake into small squares. Now, I cant give advice on this because I did a small calculation with a ruler and then guestimated it!

They weren’t all square but I was ok with how they look. They could have just fallen apart but they didn’t thankfully.

Now, this next bit you are suppose to give your cakes a crumb coat with the buttercream. This was when you come to putting on the icing, there isn’t loads of cake sticking out. this actually took longer than I thought. Crumb coating a large cake can be fiddly but small ones are much harder to do. But, I got them done and had them in the fridge to chill and set, ready for when I put the icing on.

The next is the part I wasn’t entirely looking forward to. I knew it meant that I had to make the icing and then try and cover the cakes, on the bake off this looked hard and really messy to do…..and let me tell it was seriously messy!!!

This is another area that I didn’t do the same as the recipe. In the recipe it says to have white fondant icing, in which you have to break into piece and mix with water. I didn’t want to do this, it seemed like a lot of work so I just bought a box of fondant icing sugar and added water until it had a slight pour/spreadable consistency. On the recipe card I have just put fondant icing, I didn’t put which type, that is up to you. For the amount I used the whole box 500g, and that worked perfectly for 18 fondant fancies, you might need more if you have more than I did.

After you made your icing up, you split the mixture into 2 bowls and add your food colouring. It can be whatever you want, but I stayed traditional and went with a pale pink and a pale yellow.

Now is the messy part, for this I advise you have a piece of baking paper or a tray under a cooling rack and ice the cakes, that way it can drip on them rather than your work surface. My dad actually helped me do this part, to speed up the process because they do take a while to do. It is fiddly it ice them, and sometimes it’s not going to be neat, but I was ok with that. They looked good to me. Once the icing was done I melted some white chocolate and drizzled it on top. I then placed them in some cupcake liners so they look nicer to present and for people to hold.

I really enjoyed making these and I’m really happy they turned out good. Ok so maybe some of you will probably think they look messy and uneven but I love how they turned out, they could have been a lot worse. Another good thing, they taste amazing!! I’ve never had one of these before and it tastes really good. My dad loves fondant fancies and he loved my ones so that’s a defiant plus.

There is only one more blog post left now for this bake off series, as it is the finals next Wednesday, but don’t worry I have lots of yummy bakes going this way. We have Halloween coming up and I have lots of plans for this. Hope your excited as I am!!!